Moving body

ABSTRACT

A moving body includes: a main body section provided with a moving mechanism; a peripheral information detection sensor configured to detect an obstacle peripheral to the main body section; and a control section configured to cause the main body section to autonomously travel by controlling the moving mechanism based on information regarding the peripheral obstacle detected by the peripheral information detection sensor, and configured to cause information relating to the peripheral obstacle, in a direction of progress of the main body section, to be displayed in a surrounding area of the main body section.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is based on and claims priority under 35 USC 119 fromJapanese Patent Application No. 2021-122674 filed on Jul. 27, 2021, thedisclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein.

BACKGROUND Technical Field

The present disclosure relates to a moving body.

Related Art

Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No. 2020-70159 discloses adelivery system including an autonomous traveling vehicle thatautonomously travels toward a delivery destination, and a drone that isinstalled at the autonomous traveling vehicle and that delivers apackage to the delivery destination after the autonomous travelingvehicle has arrived at a vicinity of the delivery destination.

However, in a configuration in which unmanned delivery is carried out bya moving body that autonomously travels, such as the delivery systemdescribed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No.2020-70159, there is room for improvement from the standpoint ofeliminating anxiety due to not knowing whether the moving body has beenable to detect persons at its surroundings.

SUMMARY

The present disclosure provides a moving body that is capable ofeliminating anxiety of persons at its surroundings even during movement.

A first aspect of the present disclosure is a moving body including: amain body section provided with a moving mechanism; a peripheralinformation detection sensor configured to detect an obstacle peripheralto the main body section; and a control section configured to cause themain body section to autonomously travel by controlling the movingmechanism based on information regarding the peripheral obstacledetected by the peripheral information detection sensor, and configuredto cause information relating to the peripheral obstacle, in a directionof progress of the main body section, to be displayed in a surroundingarea of the main body section.

In the moving body of the first aspect, the main body section includesthe moving mechanism, and due to the control section controlling themoving mechanism, the main body section autonomously travels. Further,the peripheral obstacle of the main body section is detected by theperipheral information detection sensor. The control section causesinformation relating to the peripheral obstacle in the direction ofprogress of the main body section to be displayed in a surrounding areasof the main body section. This enables the moving body to make personsat the surroundings of the moving body aware of information about thedetected peripheral obstacle. It should be noted that “displayed atsurroundings of the main body section” as used herein is not limited toa configuration in which display is carried out on an outer surface ofthe main body section, and is a concept that broadly encompasses aconfiguration in which projection onto a road surface at surroundings ofthe main body section is carried out. Further, “peripheral obstacle” asused herein is a concept that broadly encompasses objects that canobstruct the progression of the moving body, and includes persons,animals, vehicles, and the like.

In a second aspect of the present disclosure, in the first aspect, thecontrol section may be configured to cause a relative position of theperipheral obstacle with respect to the main body section to bedisplayed.

In the moving body of the second aspect, the relative position of theperipheral obstacle with respect to the main body section (the movingbody) is displayed, enabling persons at the surroundings to be madeaware of the positional relationship with the moving body.

In a third aspect of the present disclosure, in the second aspect, thecontrol section may be configured to change a display mode in accordancewith a distance between the main body section and the peripheralobstacle.

In the moving body of the third aspect, by changing the display mode fora person inadvertently approaching the moving body, a person at theperiphery can be made aware that they are approaching the moving body.

In a fourth aspect of the present disclosure, in the first aspect, theperipheral information detection sensor may include a camera that isconfigured to capture an image in the direction of progress, and thecontrol section may be configured to cause an image of the peripheralobstacle captured by the camera to be displayed.

In the moving body of the fourth aspect, by displaying the image of theperipheral obstacle, persons at the surroundings can grasp an objectthat the moving body has recognized.

In a fifth aspect of the present disclosure, in any one of the firstaspect to the fourth aspect, the control section may be configured tocause information relating to the peripheral obstacle to be displayed bya projection device that projects an image onto a road surface in thesurrounding area of the main body section.

In the moving body of the fifth aspect, since the information relatingto the peripheral obstacle is projected onto the road surface by theprojection device, the display area does not depend on a size of themoving body. This enables a wide display area to be secured even if themoving body is relatively small, as compared with a configuration inwhich display is carried out directly on an outer surface of the movingbody.

In a sixth aspect of the present disclosure, in any one of the firstaspect to the fifth aspect, the control section may be configured tocause a planned movement direction to be displayed.

In the moving body of the sixth aspect, by displaying the plannedmovement direction, persons at the surroundings can be made to grasp themovement direction of the moving body in advance.

As described above, the moving body according to the present disclosurecan eliminate anxiety of persons at its surroundings even duringmovement.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

An exemplary embodiment of the present disclosure will be described indetail based on the following figures, wherein:

FIG. 1 is a schematic side view in which a moving body according to anexemplary embodiment is seen from the side;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating a hardware configuration of amoving body according to an exemplary embodiment;

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example of a display projected ontoa road surface by a moving body according to an exemplary embodiment;

FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example of a display projected ontoa road surface by a moving body according to an exemplary embodiment;

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of a display projected ontoa road surface by a moving body according to an exemplary embodiment;

FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an example of a display in a modifiedexample.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Below, a moving body 10 according to an exemplary embodiment of thepresent disclosure will be explained with reference to the drawings. Asillustrated in FIG. 1 , the moving body 10 of the present exemplaryembodiment includes a substantially rectangular parallelepiped-shapedmain body section 12. It should be noted that the arrow FR and the arrowUP illustrated in FIG. 1 respectively indicate a progression direction(forward direction) of the moving body 10 and an upward direction of themoving body 10.

The main body section 12 is formed in a substantially rectangular shapein a side view, and a cargo compartment in which a package B isaccommodated is secured at an interior of the main body section 12. Inthis regard, the moving body 10 of the present exemplary embodiment isconfigured as a delivery robot that carries out delivery of packages, asone example. It should be noted that, although FIG. 1 illustrates astate in which a single package B is accommodated, there is nolimitation thereto, and a configuration may be adopted in which pluralpackages B can be accommodated.

A peripheral information detection sensor 14 that detects peripheralobstacles that are obstacles at a periphery of the moving body 10 isprovided at an upper portion of the main body section 12. The peripheralinformation detection sensor 14 of the present exemplary embodiment isconfigured including, as one example, sensors such as LIDAR (LightDetection and Ranging or Laser Imaging Detection and Ranging) or thelike. Further, aside from this, an engineering camera, radar, and thelike may be provided as the peripheral information detection sensor 14.

A projection device 16 is provided at an upper portion and a frontportion of the main body section 12. The projection device 16 is adevice that projects a predetermined image toward a road surface atsurroundings of the moving body 10, and, in the present exemplaryembodiment, the projection device 16 is configured so as to project animage onto a road surface ahead of the moving body 10, as one example.Further, the image projected onto the road surface by the projectiondevice 16 relates to information relating to peripheral obstacles of themoving body 10 that have been detected by the peripheral informationdetection sensor 14.

A front display panel 18F is provided at a front surface of the mainbody section 12, and a rear display panel 18R is provided at a rearsurface of the main body section 12. Various information is displayed oneach of the front display panel 18F and the rear display panel 18R. Inthe present exemplary embodiment, as one example, images of peripheralobstacles of the moving body 10 are displayed on the front display panel18F and the rear display panel 18R. For example, the face of a personwalking at the periphery of the moving body 10 is displayed on the frontdisplay panel 18F and the rear display panel 18R.

Hardware Configuration of the Moving Body 10

The moving body 10 is provided with a control section 19. As illustratedin FIG. 2 , the control section 19 configuring the moving body 10 isconfigured including a central processing unit (CPU; serving as aprocessor) 20, a read only memory (ROM) 22, a random access memory (RAM)24, a storage 26, a communication interface (communication I/F) 28, andan input/output interface (input/output I/F) 30. These configurationsare connected via an internal bus 32 so as to be capable ofcommunicating with each other.

The CPU 20 is a central arithmetic processing unit that executes variousprograms and controls various sections. Namely, the CPU 20 reads aprogram from the ROM 22 or the storage 26, and executes the programusing the RAM 24 as a workspace. The CPU 20 carries out control of theaforementioned respective configurations and various arithmeticprocessing according to the program recorded in the ROM 22 or thestorage 26.

The ROM 22 stores various programs and various data. The RAM 24 servesas a workspace to temporarily store a program or data. The storage 26 isconfigured by a hard disk drive (HDD) or a solid state drive (SSD), andstores various programs including an operating system, as well asvarious data.

The communication I/F 28 is an interface used by the moving body 10 tocommunicate with the main body section 12 and other devices, and, forexample, employs a standard such as a controller area network (CAN),Ethernet (registered trademark), long term evolution (LTE), a fiberdistributed data interface (FDDI), Wi-Fi (registered trademark) or thelike.

The input/output I/F 30 is electrically connected to the movingmechanism 34, the peripheral information detection sensor 14, theprojection device 16, the front display panel 18F, and the rear displaypanel 18R.

The moving mechanism 34 is a mechanism for causing the main body section12 to autonomously travel, and is configured including a pair of frontwheels 36F, a pair of rear wheels 36R, a non-illustrated motor thattransmits driving force to the front wheels 36F and the rear wheels 36R,and a non-illustrated steering angle control device that changessteering angles of the front wheels 36F and the rear wheels 36R.

Further, autonomous traveling of the moving body 10 of the presentexemplary embodiment is controlled by the control section 19. Morespecifically, the control section 19 generates a travel plan based onperipheral information detected by the peripheral information detectionsensor 14 and map information acquired from a server, and carries outautonomous traveling by controlling the moving mechanism 34 so as tomove the moving body 10 according to the generated travel plan.

The control section 19 controls the projection device 16 so as todisplay, at the surroundings of the main body section, informationrelating to peripheral obstacles at least in the progression directionof the moving body 10 including the main body section 12.

Next, an example of an image that the control section 19 causes to beprojected onto a road surface by the projection device 16 will beexplained. FIG. 3 illustrates an example of an image projected onto theroad surface by the projection device 16. As illustrated in FIG. 3 , thecontrol section 19 causes a substantially circular image M1 to bedisplayed by the projection device 16. The image M1 includes anoutermost circular portion and two concentric circles displayed morelightly than the circular portion.

Further, substantially circular images M2, M3, and M4 that are smallerthan the image M1 are displayed by the projection device 16. The imagesM2, M3, and M4 respectively indicate peripheral obstacles of the movingbody 10. More specifically, a center of the image M1 corresponds to aposition of the moving body 10, and relative positions of the peripheralobstacles with respect to the position of the moving body 10 areindicated by the images M2, M3, and M4.

As one example, an upward direction in the drawing in which the image M2is present coincides with a progression direction (forward direction) ofthe moving body 10. As a result, the peripheral obstacle correspondingto the image M2 is positioned ahead of the moving body 10. Further, theperipheral obstacle corresponding to the image M3 is positioned on theright side of the moving body 10. Moreover, the peripheral obstaclecorresponding to the image M4 is positioned toward the left and rear ofthe moving body 10. In this manner, in the present exemplary embodiment,the control section 19 causes the relative positions of the peripheralobstacles with respect to the main body section 12 of the moving body 10to be displayed by the projection device 16.

Further, the control section 19 changes display modes of the images M2,M3, and M4 according to distances between the moving body 10 and theperipheral obstacles. More specifically, as illustrated in FIG. 4 , in acase in which a distance between the peripheral obstacle correspondingto the image M2 and the moving body 10 becomes less than a predetermineddistance, the control section 19 carries out display by changing a colorof the image M2. More specifically, the control section 19 is configuredso as to change the color of the image M2 corresponding to theperipheral obstacle that has come closer to the center (moving body 10)of the image M1 than the innermost circle of the image M1.

Moreover, in the present exemplary embodiment, the control section 19causes a planned movement direction of the main body section 12 to beprojected onto the road surface by the projection device 16. Morespecifically, as illustrated in FIG. 5 , an image M5 simulating an arrowis projected onto the road surface.

The image M5 displays the planned movement direction superimposed on theimage M1 when the moving body 10 changes course. The example of displayin FIG. 5 is an example of a display at a time when the moving body 10changes course in order to avoid a peripheral obstacle because theperipheral obstacle corresponding to the image M2 is present in theprogression direction.

Operation

Next, operation of the present exemplary embodiment will be explained.

In the moving body 10 according to the present exemplary embodiment, asillustrated in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2 , the main body section 12 includes themoving mechanism 34, and, due to the control section 19 controlling themoving mechanism 34, the main body section 12 autonomously travels.Further, the peripheral obstacles of the main body section 12 aredetected by the peripheral information detection sensor 14.

The control section 19 causes information relating to peripheralobstacles at least in the progression direction of the main body section12 to be displayed at the surroundings of the main body section 12. Thisenables the moving body 10 to make persons at the surroundings of themoving body 10 aware of information about the detected peripheralobstacles.

Further, as illustrated in FIG. 3 and FIG. 4 , in the present exemplaryembodiment, the relative positions of the peripheral obstacles withrespect to the main body section 12 are displayed by the projectiondevice 16 on the road surface as the image M2, the image M3, and theimage M4, enabling persons at the surroundings to be made aware of thepositional relationships with the moving body 10.

Moreover, since the information relating to the peripheral obstacles isprojected onto the road surface by the projection device 16, the displayarea does not depend on a size of the moving body 10. This enables awide display area to be secured even if the moving body 10 is relativelysmall.

Furthermore, by changing display colors (display modes) of the image M2,the image M3, and the image M4 for a person inadvertently approachingthe moving body 10, a person at the periphery can be made aware thatthey are approaching the moving body.

Further, as illustrated in FIG. 5 , in the present exemplary embodiment,by displaying the planned movement direction of the main body section 12(the moving body 10) as the image M5, persons at the surroundings can bemade to grasp the movement direction of the moving body 10 in advance.

Furthermore, in the present exemplary embodiment, by displaying imagesof the peripheral obstacles on the front display panel 18F and the reardisplay panel 18R, persons at the surroundings can grasp the objectsthat the moving body 10 has recognized.

It should be noted that, in the present exemplary embodiment, theconfiguration of the modified example illustrated in FIG. 6 may beadopted as an image projected by the projection device 16.

Modified Examples

As illustrated in FIG. 6 , in the present modified example, the image M1and an image M6 are projected onto the road surface by the projectiondevice 16. The image M6 is an image of a peripheral obstacle captured bya camera that captures an image of the progression direction of themoving body 10. More specifically, the control section 19 projects aface of a person in the progression direction of the moving body 10 ontothe road surface as the image M6.

Further, in a case in which persons serving as plural peripheralobstacles are detected in the progression direction of the moving body10, the control section 19 causes a face of a person that is closest tothe moving body 10 to be projected onto the road surface as the imageM6.

In the present modified example, by projecting a face of a persondetected by the moving body 10 onto the road surface as the image M6, aperson at the surroundings of the moving body 10 can be made to graspthat the moving body 10 has recognized the face of the person.

Although explanation has been provided above regarding the moving body10 according to the exemplary embodiments, it is obvious that a varietyof aspects may be implemented within a range that does not depart fromthe gist of the present disclosure. In the aforementioned exemplaryembodiments, although the information relating to the peripheralobstacles is displayed on the road surface by the projection device 16as illustrated in FIG. 1 , there is no limitation thereto. For example,a configuration that does not include the projection device 16 may beadopted. In this case, the information relating to the peripheralobstacles may be displayed on the front display panel 18F and the reardisplay panel 18R. Furthermore, display panels may also be disposed onside surfaces of the main body section 12, and images of peripheralobstacles facing the respective display panels or the like may bedisplayed on the respective display panels.

Further, in the aforementioned exemplary embodiments, although displayis carried out by changing the color of the image M2 of the peripheralobstacle that has approached the moving body 10 as illustrated in FIG. 4, there is no limitation thereto. For example, an image corresponding toa peripheral obstacle that has approached the moving body 10 may becaused to flash. Moreover, in the aforementioned exemplary embodiments,although the peripheral obstacles are displayed with substantiallycircular images, there is no limitation thereto, and the shapes of theimages may be modified as appropriate. For example, the shapes of theimages may be changed according to the types of the peripheralobstacles. Namely, in a case in which a peripheral obstacle detected bythe peripheral information detection sensor 14 is a vehicle, an imagehaving a shape simulating a vehicle may be displayed.

Moreover, in a case in which a recipient of the package B that themoving body 10 is delivering is nearby, an image corresponding to therecipient may be displayed in a different color from other peripheralobstacles. For example, in a case in which the moving body 10 receives asignal transmitted from a portable terminal of the recipient to therebyauthenticate that they are the recipient of the package B, the color ofthe image corresponding to the recipient is changed. This enables themoving body 10 that is delivering the package B to be quickly graspedeven in a case in which plural moving bodies are traveling at thesurroundings of the recipient.

What is claimed is:
 1. A moving body, comprising: a main body sectionprovided with a moving mechanism; a peripheral information detectionsensor configured to detect an obstacle peripheral to the main bodysection; and a control section configured to cause the main body sectionto autonomously travel by controlling the moving mechanism based oninformation regarding the peripheral obstacle detected by the peripheralinformation detection sensor, and configured to cause informationrelating to the peripheral obstacle, in a direction of progress of themain body section, to be displayed in a surrounding area of the mainbody section.
 2. The moving body according to claim 1, wherein thecontrol section is configured to cause a relative position of theperipheral obstacle with respect to the main body section to bedisplayed.
 3. The moving body according to claim 2, wherein the controlsection is configured to change a display mode in accordance with adistance between the main body section and the peripheral obstacle. 4.The moving body according to claim 1, wherein: the peripheralinformation detection sensor includes a camera that is configured tocapture an image in the direction of progress, and the control sectionis configured to cause an image of the peripheral obstacle captured bythe camera to be displayed.
 5. The moving body according to claim 1,wherein the control section is configured to cause information relatingto the peripheral obstacle to be displayed by a projection device thatprojects an image onto a road surface in the surrounding area of themain body section.
 6. The moving body according to claim 1, wherein thecontrol section is configured to cause a planned movement direction tobe displayed.
 7. The moving body according to claim 3, wherein thecontrol section is configured to carry out display by changing a colorof an image in a case in which the distance between the main bodysection and the peripheral obstacle has become less than a predetermineddistance.